Month: December 2010

SAVE the University has circulated the following statement to the UCB administration. It concerns the manifest failings of the new AP Bears on-line system for documenting faculty activity for promotion — replacing the old annual bio-bibliography. Unfortunately, AP Bears is … Continue reading →

Statement on Pension Reform at UC Presented to UC Regents, Dec. 13, 2010 by Richard Walker, Vice-Chair of the Berkeley Faculty Association The Berkeley Faculty Association (BFA) is deeply concerned about the state of the University of California Retirement Plan … Continue reading →

Historically, UC has offered the unparalleled combination of premier faculty, path-breaking research, top-ranked graduate programs, and sterling undergraduate education available to the top 8th of California high school students. All of these are now seriously threatened by the state fiscal crisis and the Commission on the Future is to be commended for thinking hard about how to secure faculty, research and graduate programs amidst these threats. What it proposes to throw under the bus, however, is undergraduate education–both its access by California students and its quality. This is particularly evident in the recommendations to develop pathways toward 3-year degrees and on-line courses, and in the move to increase out-of-state students at the very moment when in-state students are losing the educational access promised by the California Master Plan. Continue reading →

With the University of California facing an increasingly precarious financial situation, the university’s Commission on the Future unveiled its final recommendations for maintaining the UC’s fiscal viability on Monday, December 6, 2010. Continue reading →

The panel’s report was quickly criticized by faculty members who view online classes and three-year degrees as quick money-makers that may fill university coffers, but ultimately come at the cost of a quality college education.

“These efforts to push people through in three years and moving to online education reflects a privatized model where you bring people in based on how much profit they’ll create,” said Stanton Glantz, vice president of the Council of UC Faculty Associations. “The priorities of the institution will reflect the market interests instead of the public interest.”Continue reading →